04/23/14

04/23/14

Today was the beginning of my journey on the film! It started out at about 5 am this morning (it’s a wonder that I’m as awake as I am right now, considering its quarter to one am the next day…but it’s undoubtedly the adrenaline and excitement of being here with this group of people.) My lovely roommate Cascade was nice enough to give my co-star Nate and I a ride to Burbank airport early enough to get us there at 6 am! Travel was smooth. I am usually a good flyer, but we encountered a lot of turbulence on the descents for both of our flights (Burbank to Denver, Denver to Billings) and I almost hurled on both flights. I was able to meditate through them both. 

It didn’t take long for the production to start encountering road blocks. A key member of our crew who was supposed to be flying with members of the cast missed the flight out of Burbank! We will endure, although we were supposed to shoot some guerrilla footage during our trip and that is now out since we will not be flying together again. Murphy’s Law was in full effect today. I lost my kindle…like an idiot…(sorry mom! :( ) our lead actress’ luggage got left in Denver, which contained wardrobe for not just her but for another cast member. Fingers crossed that it will arrive tomorrow. We had a read through with the cast, crew and the addition of local cast members who I was meeting for the first time. I got to meet the gentleman playing Abel, a character I will have lots of interaction with, as well as two ladies Donna and Deb who will be playing large roles. The read through went well, but we have new copies of the script that the director, went to the get printed. He got halfway through one copy and the printer ran out of toner, and no one there knew how to change it! We made it through the read through fine, and it was great to hear the script out loud, see small bits that need polishing and also how many laughs there are and great moments we have to look forward to. 

So far I have been to four places in Sheridan. Qdoba (oh, how I’ve missed you) Walmart (bought some needed toiletries and such) Our house! We have a big, nice, house. The two girls on the entire trip are being true troopers in a house full of men. It’s a little like living in a frat house, a little like camping, a LOT like low budget indie filmmaking and cannot be a cooler way to spend the next three weeks. The rooms are wide open spaces and everyone has their own little nest with their bags and an air mattress. People stay up until late hours of the night playing video games, reading scripts, journaling and talking about life and film. There is such a contagious love of film in this household it is truly invigorating. At any time there are people in 3 different areas of the house, and you will find a common them with a passionate love of film and knowledge of the culture, or something else like comic books…or food. I don’t think these are people I will get sick of, only people who I will grow to love more. I’ve been thinking today about how we are staying here for THREE WEEKS. Thats  A LONG time! By the end of this shoot, I’m going to start dreaming about this house. 

The last place we went was a steakhouse for dinner. It was great to sit down with everyone and order a meal. Yes, I paid my own bill, but I will be being taken care of for the shoot. I have no problem with the ‘indie-ness’ of this project. There is no ego, no diva-ness. We are all just here to be young and excited and kick some ass. I know that there will be problems that we encounter, but I have faith that we will overcome all of our obstacles. I have such faith in the production crew of this film. I’ve given up trying to talk about what will be in the future for this project, but that’s because things keep changing and there’s nothing I can do about it. It doesn’t shake my faith in the film itself though, I know that at the end of the day…we will have created something special. I know that I have a lot of work ahead of me. I have to throw myself into the script and use all of my training to be prepared to go to work each day. We do not shoot tomorrow, but we will be taking a ‘tour’ of sorts and visiting all of the locations, to get a feel for our locations. Today has sort of felt like a fun, bonding day of silliness. I don’t think anyone underestimates the amount of work we have ahead of us in the next three days. We will be rocking and rolling. I’m ready to go to work. That’s all for now.